Oxford Dictionary of English 12+

Very useful

Does everything I expected. Simple UI, but a little sparse. Created for Windows users by the look of it. Needs some cosmetic changes to be more Mac-like.
Its strong points, which the Mac native Dictionary lacks, is pronunciation, wildcards (called Pattern searches) and bookmarks. And it remembers all the words you’ve looked up via the arrow keys.
I also bought the companion app "Chambers Thesarus" and it appears as a separate tab in the Dictionary window, making switching between the two apps simple using the same word.
One criticism is that the dictionary appears with a black background rather than the white one in the app's illustration and the Preferences are too scant to change it.
Could also use a more complete Help page which doesn’t mention wildcards at all. (See under Search/Pattern placeholder for the available wildcards.)
Very useful and good value for money - both of them.

Just discovered a handy hidden feature. Surprised it isn’t announced.
The Dictionary will register a word that has been copied in another app.
Does it immediately without fanfare and even when the Dictionary is hidden in the background. Huh!

Everything is fine except the audio pronunciation

It’s fast and integrated within secondary click pop-out menu, so you can use it easily as the origianl OSx dictionary. The interface is not fancy looking but that’s fine. The only thing that needs to be improved is the audio pronunciation. The audio quality is like 32kbps mp3 and almost intoleralble!

Developer Response ,

Version 3.5 now has higher quality audio.

Unable to install on iMac 21"

I purchased this to get past the incessant need to correct the USA spelling in favour of UK / Aus forms.
I don’t want an “app” for an iPhone or iPod!
Having read the promotional material, purchased what puported to be an application for the iMac, downloaded it and followed the MS Office for Mac install instructions I am unable to get the Oxford English Dictionary installed and working.
MS Word looks for a *.dic file which this download isn’t. The Mac install instructions recommended resetting the options to “All Files” - that didn’t work.
It seems I’ve wasted $USD_15 = $AUD_22.
Not at all happy.

Developer Response ,

This is a stand-alone dictionary, not a plug in for MS Word.